The bug glided across the pane, oblivious to the scrutiny of the man on the other side.
Its legs worked independently and yet with such clockwork precision as to convey the illusion of a single unit in perpetual motion—smooth, like a skater on polished ice.
The man let his mind follow the bug, become engrossed in its journey, an exploration that had more to do with him than with it.

A bump stalled the tiny creature.
Its feelers swirled at a fierce pace, like the blades of a helicopter.
“What invades this path?” it seemed to ask through the flourish.

Exploration complete, the bug re-engaged in the march, a slow, steady advance.
The man found some small measure of peace in sharing this quest, a sort of zen-and-the-art-of-bug-watching tranquility that distracted him from a tormented afternoon.
He consciously chose to put his attention on the bug, away from himself and his own disturbing inner chatter.

“What will happen, next?” he suddenly found himself wondering. “What will happen when the bug reaches the edge?”
Onward and upward.
The bug fulfilled its function, that special one that only a bug can fulfill.
“What function?” questioned the man. “What is this bug doing and why does it matter?”

The man watched without answers, engrossed, involved and happily distracted.
Or maybe not.
Perhaps the distraction served only as a band-aid, a temporary reprieve from the inevitable, the need to turn his focus back on himself and the heavy feeling that clung to him like a rotting moss and made him feel the slime, the mud and the weight of it all.

Yuck!
What a funky space!
He wished for a moment that he could switch places, step into a reality governed only by instinct and the difficult task of survival—one that at least would quiet the screaming voices.

“Why am I here?” The man flogged himself unknowingly. “What’s the point?”
The rhetoric hung in the air like stale cigar smoke.
Clop, clop, clop, cease.
Check, ascertain, resume.
The bug stayed its course.
“Predictable,” noted the man, “though only if one knows the ways of bugs.”

Finally, the bug crested over the edge and disappeared.
The man sighed, felt his shoulders relax and let it go.